


a vessel to bear me home

by LeilaKalomi



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: (but not really), Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, But Everyone is Ok, Crowley is a Mess (Good Omens), Demon Summoning, Discorporation (Good Omens), Exorcisms, Grief/Mourning, Lower Tadfield (Good Omens), M/M, Other, POV Crowley (Good Omens), Possession, The Chattering Order of Saint Beryl, most of the possessions are nonconsensual
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-30
Updated: 2020-11-02
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:27:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27287161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LeilaKalomi/pseuds/LeilaKalomi
Summary: When an accident after the aborted Armageddon discorporates Aziraphale, he still can't bring himself to give up on Crowley. Crowley, desperate for any contact with Aziraphale he can find, becomes an exorcist, so he'll always be aware of any possessions...which always seem to spring up near him.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 26
Kudos: 90
Collections: Racket’s 13 Days of Halloween





	1. Chapter 1

When the Order of the Chattering Nuns reopened, it was more than 20 years later, and none of the women remembered the original incarnation of their order. None of them knew why a Satanic order needed, of all things, an exorcist.

Even so, Father Crowley was much sought after. He was tall, thin—almost wiry—and very flustered. No one could quite say why. No one could say why, when he went home in the evenings, he sat awake all night, unable to sleep, unable to do anything but drink Talisker until dawn then purge it from his system and start all over again, always the same sort of day: Waiting.

But then, no one knew about that.

To them, Father Crowley was an upstanding (well, as upstanding as a member of a Satanic order might be) member of their community. To them, Father Crowley was a beacon of the kind of demonic blessing that might fall upon a truly devoted member. His serpentine eyes, which he often hid behind a pair of sunglasses, were a blessing, to be sure, even if they were haunted, or sometimes dazed.

He had been there for some three years now, and he’d noticed a pattern. In those early days, when it had first happened, he’d been bereft, unable to cope. Those had been, in some ways, the good days, when he could at least look to the comfort of sleep, when he still had hope and the acquaintance of others who remembered the angel, when he could still remember the time before the accident, so close he felt he could reach out and touch it, that if, perhaps, he could just wind things up a _little_ harder, he could not only stop time, but push it back _just enough_. Then he’d stop it if he had to, and hold on forever, if it was the only way to keep the angel with him. Ironic, it was, that it hadn’t been Crowley’s driving, but Aziraphale’s desire to get out of the car that had done it, some speeding human, tearing too close to the side of the road, Aziraphale not looking, _Crowley not looking_ , which seemed unthinkable now. How could he have been with the angel and not looking at him? Ungrateful, he had been, stupid, not to see the gift of every moment they’d had. The human had been distraught. Crowley’d let him get arrested, hauled away. He felt hollow. They had no idea what they’d done, what heaven would do to Aziraphale. They’d push him into Hellfire now, for sure, and with no body to hide inside, no way Crowley could protect him.

But now, it had been too long. Crowley grew weaker, no longer sure of his ability to hold on to time at all, much less to wind it back—something he’d never done to begin with.

And now, there was the other thing. The thing that brought him both hope and misery. The exorcisms. Or, well, perhaps it was more accurate to say, the possessions. Plural.

Because they happened around him. Other people didn’t notice the pattern, the way when he was called in to fix one, others sprung up around him. The first one had been different, as if the angel was only finding his way. Crowley had only noticed it at all because he felt something, something that couldn't be, something he found in Tadfield.

He remembered the woman, a Mary Hodges, used to be one of those embarrassing Satanic nuns. She’d gone all funny when some of her former nun friends had come to visit and they’d already started to put out the alarm. Crowley held it off. It felt like Aziraphale. And he wasn’t risking that, not when he’d spent the last week curled into the fetal position, rocking back and forth and wondering what he’d do if Hell tried to take him back now. Might not have the strength to resist.

But as soon as he’d walked in, he’d known. Mary Hodges’s face lit up with Aziraphale’s smile.

“ _Crowley_ ,” came his voice.

“Master Crowley!” one of the other women cried. Crowley snapped his fingers, silencing her, silencing the lot of them. He lifted Aziraphale into his arms.

“Don’t you _ever_ fucking do that again,” he snarled, squeezing him too tight for the human body he was in.

“Darling! Do be careful. It won’t do to leave her with broken bones.”

“Leave her?” And just like that, Crowley’s relief was ebbing, sliding into panic. “What are you—we’ll find you a—”

“Crowley…” Aziraphale shook Mary Hodges’s head. “I wanted to say goodbye.”

“No!”

“I’m so sorry, my dear. I know it… it wasn’t long, in the end. But it was something, wasn’t it? To be together without fear.”

They hadn’t, though. Not the way Crowley had wanted. He’d never told him how he felt, not really. Aziraphale had always seemed so happy just the way things were, and that was really what was important, he’d told himself. And now…the thought that he hadn’t even known how loved he’d been.

“Are they…going to keep you up there?” It was the only way he could think of to ask it. He couldn’t bring himself to mention the fire.

“I don’t know,” Aziraphale said, and he cupped Crowley’s face. “I waited a long time,” he said. “She’ll be ill, I’m afraid. She was…quite difficult to possess, but I thought you would find me here at least. I’m so sorry, dearest.”

And he was gone.

Crowley fell to his knees in grief.

* * *

He’d thought it was the last time, but it hadn’t been.

After that, the former nuns somehow got the idea that it had been a possession, that the demon Crowley had been, not the demon they knew and remembered, but a priest of their former religion. They were aging, yes, but they quickly reestablished their old order, though Mary Hodges insisted she would have nothing to do with it. She did not remember the possession, though she’d lost more than a day to it. She had not been so ill in the aftermath as Aziraphale had seemed to think, had only needed a long sleep, a few days’ rest.

Crowley, meanwhile, went to find Tracy. She’d moved from London with Sergeant Shadwell, since the apocalypse, and though he’d passed away, Tracy was still living in the house they’d had together. She was much older now. He watched her from a distance, but Aziraphale didn’t return to inhabit her frail form. Instead, he chose a shopkeeper in the little coastal town where Tracy lived. And then, when Crowley went back home, he popped up in London, an American tourist. Crowley had coffee with him. It wasn’t long after that he popped up in Mayfair, in a new tenant in his building. That one had hurt, knowing that he wouldn’t be there any longer when Crowley went back down the stairs.

Crowley wanted to keep him, didn’t care what he looked like, didn’t care what the fallout might be to some human, their life abandoned. But Aziraphale wouldn't hear of it. “It’s already a dreadful imposition,” he’d said. When he met someone resistant, he’d leave.

When Crowley had been up in Tadfield, visiting Book Girl for ideas, he’d been interrupted by Aziraphale in Newt’s body, taking his hands and squeezing, asking if perhaps they might not take a walk together, as he did so miss him.

“You see?” Crowley said to Anathema. “Can’t you do something?

Anathema just stared.

“Newton will be fine,” Aziraphale promised. Crowley gave an exasperated sigh. He couldn’t care less about _Newton_.

Anathema must have been the one to tell the nuns. There were, then, so many willing bodies in Tadfield, and so much comparative fallout from the possessions in London (people _had_ noticed) that Crowley relocated, eventually, to Tadfield, and then to another small village outside Tadfield, the village where the nuns had rebuilt.

And twenty years later, as far as anyone in the vicinity remembered, he was Father Crowley, who did the exorcisms (for which there was great need, as there was now at least one possession every few months or so).

He was Father Crowley, who couldn’t sleep, couldn’t risk it, any moment, because any moment, Aziraphale might come, and Crowley would be needed. And Crowley, well, he needed too.

* * *

There was no easy fix, nothing he could think of. At first, he’d begged Anathema, then, Adam. He’d tried Adam again when he was older, when it wasn’t creepy—him begging a fourteen year old to please, just come with him and see. The Youngs hadn’t appreciated it, and Crowley couldn’t blame them, hadn’t the energy to freeze them and make them comply. Adam _said_ he couldn’t help, but Crowley didn’t want to challenge him by threatening his parents. He wasn’t anxious to be wiped out of existence, thanks.

So for years now, he hadn’t tried, had only focused on clearing the room when the possessions happened, so he and Aziraphale could talk in private. Aziraphale was careful, gently cleansing himself from their minds, removing any trauma he’d caused, and after he was gone, Crowley would get rid of any lingering sense of an angel, any memory of anything not enough like an exorcism. Usually, he left them blank. Sometimes, he had a bit of fun and made them scream so people could hear. When he did, it sounded worse than it was: just screaming without any pain. He’d never hurt them. He knew by now that Aziraphale might not come back if he thought the possession harmed them in any way, so Crowley helped him make sure it didn’t. And Aziraphale always came back.

For a while, it was…something. Not _good_ , exactly. Nothing like what they’d had before. But there was a kind of certainty to it, a kind of peace Crowley found. Aziraphale at least had managed to escape the Archangels’ notice, and so, their punishment. They saw each other more than they had for most of their time on Earth, though not nearly as much as in those few months after the failed Armageddon.

But then, in a rare encounter that didn’t have to look like an exorcism, they took a walk on the beach, rocky sand beneath chalky cliffs. Aziraphale had possessed a man who ran a motorboat tour agency. He was dressed in windbreakers, his brown hair thrown back in the wind. His fingers brushed against Crowley’s and Crowley turned to him and they smiled at each other. But…he drew away. Right. It wouldn’t be…wasn’t his body to decide about. Crowley cringed, tried to keep it off his face. Aziraphale, though, looked suddenly sad.

“Oh, Crowley,” he said, shaking his head. The man’s eyes were large, as if they’d been built to show despair.

“I—”

“It’s too much, isn’t it? Worse this way, perhaps?”

“Wh—?”

“I should go. I should leave you in peace. Oh, good lord. I’ve been so selfish.” He paused, shook his head. “Oh, oh, dear.”

“No. Angel, please don’t—” He reached out, wrapping his hand around Aziraphale’s. But it was the wrong thing, he remembered too late. Aziraphale’s face crumpled and he shook his head, pulling his hand away. Crowley could feel his shoulders starting to shake.

“Don’t,” he said again. “Aziraphale, please.”

“It’ll be better this way,” he said. “I’m sorry, Crowley. But I do think—yes. It’ll hurt less this way.”

Crowley clamped a hand over his mouth. The ocean roared. It seemed suddenly too loud even as it didn’t seem real. What was the point of it anyway? It wasn’t even holy water he could dissolve into.

Beside him, the man coughed, a stranger.

“Oi, mate?” he said, looking around, confused.

Crowley didn’t bother to smooth things over. He sneered at him and stalked away.


	2. Chapter 2

* * *

He headed back to the priory. He drove fast at first, but his leg grew tired, which was odd, but not really, because everything was tired, everything _hurt_ , and he backed off, eventually going so slowly that someone pulled up behind him and honked the horn at him impatiently. Crowley didn’t speed up then. He couldn’t. It was the principle of the thing, sure, but more than that, it was just that he didn’t care. He pulled the car to the side of the road and rested his head against the steering wheel until it dug into his flesh.

He woke up at about 3 a.m., still in the same spot, the car still running, and a dull ache in his chest. He thought about cranking the car, but didn’t see the point. After another hour or so, he decided to try anyway. His hips ached from sitting in the same spot for so long, and it would be better, if he were going to burrow and hibernate, to do it in a bed than to risk getting carted off by some overzealous patrolman. He drove at a reasonable pace, and as he parked the car, he thought that at least he didn’t have to live it down now, since Aziraphale wasn’t around to make fun of him. But then it was hard to remember why he needed to go inside, why he couldn’t just stop. Stop walking, stop moving, stop breathing, stop doing anything at all.

He slept. Of course he did. When he woke up, at odd intervals, he wondered what the criteria would be for staying awake. After all, there wasn’t anything left to look forward to. There wasn’t anything, really, that could change.

It had been about four months when he woke, this time not because his arm had twisted under him, or because of the bloody lorries backing up on the grounds of the priory.

No, this was...something else.

He sat up. There was a soft glow, at the door of his room, and a feeling, a feeling that couldn’t—

“Aziraphale?” he said, because it was dark, and he was groggy, and perhaps, he could stand to be wrong if he could just go back to sleep after.

“Hello, dear fellow.” The voice was soft, gentle. Apologetic.

“Angel? What’s wrong?” Crowley stood up, moved toward him. He could see him there, translucent, barely discernible, really, like he’d been the night of the fire, and Crowley had thought...he _envied_ himself that night, envied all he’d had to look forward to.

“You’re sleeping again. I’ve come over and over and you never move. I can tell that much. Oh, Crowley, dearest. Please. You have to try.”

Crowley froze. “You came? I missed you? Did you...did you find a body?”

“ _No_. I can’t do that. I...it was selfish, you must understand. I was wrong to do that. It never should have happened.”

“No one was hurt.”

Aziraphale’s glowing form twitched. “You were, dear.”

Crowley reached for him, remembered a flicker across from him in a pub.

_I do need a body. Pity I can’t inhabit yours._

He’d been afraid then, of destroying them. But what was the alternative now, really? There was nothing worse than this, of existing without him, anyway.

“You could possess me!” he exclaimed, suddenly full of wild, irrational hope.

“No, no.” Aziraphale said. “Absolutely not. It’s not _safe_. You could be discorporated, too, with both of us in there.”

 _I don’t care_ , Crowley thought. He didn’t care if it _destroyed_ him completely, but...well, not Aziraphale, of course. Though at this point, they both knew that was hardly likely.

“What if it were?” he said. “Safe?”

There was a silence. Aziraphale’s eyes, unseeing, flickered down.

“There’s no way we could know that.”

“What if I could find out? For sure. What if we could know? Would you come back?”

But now Aziraphale fidgeted. He looked around, and it didn’t seem to Crowley that what he was seeing was just the dark of the priory hall.

“Oh, dear. I’ve got to go. If you need me, remember that there’s a circle in the bookshop. If you can—you’ll need to modify it, of course. I don’t want them to notice I’m here. But, well, in that vein, I’ve really got to—”

“Aziraphale?”

“Of course I’d come then, dearest. Of course I would. Only, I think Gabriel might have seen—oh, Crowley, I’ve really got to go. ”

But he didn’t. He waited, the image of him shimmering with a tremor. Crowley realized he was waiting for permission, for release.

“Go on, angel,” he said, his voice a whisper, careful and reverent. He wished it could have been an embrace.

The light faded. _Bloody Gabriel_ , Crowley thought. That answered the question then—Aziraphale was in Heaven. He wouldn’t last long there. Crowley had to get him out somehow, get him back.

He ran his hands through his hair, tangled and straggling. He pushed it away from his face, snapped his fingers to tidy the bed, cut his hair. He had the beginnings of an idea creeping in.

Father Crowley would need to make an appearance.

* * *

He tracked them down, the head nuns. He couldn’t be bothered to keep track of their names: Mother Superior Barbara Blathery or whatever. Sister Autherine Who-Won’t-Shut-Up. Whatever. It was painful, honestly. And it was such a relief to feel that pain instead of the other. He pushed the thought of it away. If this worked, all he’d have to worry about would be feeling embarrassed for these people who had no fucking idea what they were exalting. But for now, that—the connection they sought to the place he’d left behind forever—was just what he needed. If Heaven wouldn’t give Aziraphale a body, he’d get him one from Hell.

Satanist nuns don’t have Sunday services. Apparently. But they listened to him, more or less. And when he told them he needed an assembly, when he told them what for, they made it happen.

There were thirteen of them, altogether, assembled for the Summoning. Crowley directed the Mother Superior, and she held the Grimoire out in front of her, reading. But there were certain differences between what she was to say and what was written in the text. Crowley had explained it to her. He hadn’t told her _why_ , but the point was, he didn’t want them to summon _a demon_ , he wanted them to summon one particular demon. Without alerting the rest of Hell.

Her voice rang out, loud and clear and proud, and Crowley ignored the stab of embarrassment he felt whenever they mentioned Satan himself and concentrated. Demon summoning didn’t work on its own, however much these women believed. But this one would work for the same reason it had ever seemed to work: because a demon was already there, reaching through the channel they opened for another of his ilk.

The demon who’d threatened to hit what he’d erroneously thought was Aziraphale appeared. His hair, which to Crowley resembled nothing more than bunny ears, probably made a nice, hornlike impression upon the women, who gasped and drew away as he burst into the room—not at the center of them, as they’d doubtless expected, but just behind Crowley, who turned to look at him.

“Eric!” he said. “It’s been a long time!”

The demon frowned, not angry, not judging—Crowley had been right about him then—but confused, wary.

“Crowley!” he shouted. Behind him, at the center of the circle, Crowley heard Blathery starting to move and of course to talk, and he raised a hand, snapped a finger, and froze them all. He had to do this right.

“Remember that time you tried to hit that angel?” he said.

“I—”

But Crowley narrowed his eyes, raising a hand that held a small silver flask, and he stilled. Crowley could see in his face that he _knew_. He _knew_ that that angel was the wrong person to argue with Crowley about. He nodded then, his brows drawing together. His face was...unfortunate, Crowley thought. Soft. Too expressive for a demon. He could relate. Well. There was no hope for _him_ , not really, but there was for Crowley, and he could live in it again. He just had to make this work.

“Now, Eric,” he said. “I’d really hate to have to use this. But I think you know—I _will_.”

Eric gulped and nodded. His right hand clutched at something, his black nails glinting in the candlelight. Crowley’s eyes flew to it, but it was only a phablet—one of his own inventions, too big to fit in a pocket.

“What is it you...you want?” Eric said.

“A body,” Crowley said. “You do make them _so_ easily.” He leaned in, his face inches from Eric’s. “Tell me how it’s done.”

Eric gulped and drew back. _Oh, no, you don’t._ Crowley leaned in again, looping his fingers into the stylishly ripped neck of Eric’s top.

“ _Now._ ”

“Well, not everyone can...can do it. I mean. You can...turn into a snake, right? And...and Hastur can turn to _multiple—”_

“ _Arrggh!_ ” Crowley shouted. “I don’t want to hear about _Hastur_!”

“Right. Well. That’s...fair. Although I guess that’s...I mean, demon—”

“Get to the _point!”_

“My point is! Well! If you can’t _divide_ , then you just _can’t_. Sorry.”

Something sagged in Crowley, but he didn’t let go. There had to be something. If he tightened his hold on Eric...if he squeezed, knocked the breath from him...then he’d just make a new body. But he didn’t _have_ to do that. Eric could just…

Crowley let go.

“Then make me a body. Just a body. Not another...” he waved a hand at him, “you. Just make me one, and get out of it.”

“What? Now? I mean, there are easier ways of getting a dead body, Crowley. You must know that.”

“I don’t want a _dead body_ ,” Crowley said.

“Oh,” Eric said. “Well. All right. I can...but, like, now?”

Crowley relaxed slightly, stepping back a little, breathing in a little less of the air around Eric, thick with the stink of Hell. Eric hadn’t objected. Maybe he could have this. This could work. It could really work.

“No,” Crowley said. “Come with me.”

He snapped his fingers.

“Thank you for your service,” he said to the nuns, and jerked Eric away with him, leaving them shouting a confused volley of questions at him and each other.

It was cold outside, winter or something. Crowley really didn’t know. He had no idea _when_ he’d woken up, and hadn’t bothered to check. The drive to London was tense at first, but Eric’s chatter, as thick as the nuns’, turned out to be somewhat tolerable at least. He had a proper sense of respect for the work Crowley had done, the stuff he’d actually been proud of.

But he did seem confused when they got out at the bookshop. At the door of it, he nearly backed away entirely.

“This place is...ethereal,” he said.

Crowley rolled his eyes. “I know that. Why do you think we’re here? Just...keep quiet. Stay where I tell you.”

Eric allowed himself to be relegated to a corner, where he immediately pulled out his phablet and got absorbed in what seemed to be some sort of online multiplayer game with loud, ominous music. Good. The last thing Crowley needed was him nosing around.

He looked around. The place was covered with twenty-odd years of dust. Crowley miracled it away and looked around. He found the book he wanted, sighed, and rolled up the carpet. There was work to do.


	3. Chapter 3

Once he’d found the correct sigil for Aziraphale specifically, he was ready. Well, he was ready to risk it. He hoped it didn’t work like some sort of intercom system, with his voice ringing out through Heaven, alerting everyone to Aziraphale’s presence and possibly even his location. Oh, fuck. He wasn’t sure about this at all. But the angel had _said_ …

He lit the first candle, and stood back, taking a long breath.

“What are you doing?” Eric said. “Is that a heavenly portal—are you mad?”

Crowley had nearly forgotten he was there.

“ ’Course it’s not. Come with me.” Eric frowned, but followed Crowley, let himself be led into the back room where he flopped down onto the sofa and glared at Crowley. Crowley shook his head.

“Get to work on that body,” he said, stepping through the door, his hand sliding over its handle. Eric made as if to protest, but Crowley cut him off. “Stay. And don’t ask questions.”

* * *

He started over. Eight candles, eight points. He stood outside the circle, across from Aziraphale’s sigil. He hesitated.

 _Are you mad?_ Eric had asked. Crowley threw a look at the door to the backroom, which hadn’t opened. Wouldn’t, if Eric knew what was good for him. Was he mad? He didn’t know. Probably. He breathed, two times, deep. He thought of Aziraphale, which wasn’t hard. He concentrated, which was. There was a dull, clanging noise, as of gears sliding into place.

And then he felt it. _Aziraphale._

“Angel?”

“Crowley, what—?” He opened his eyes, and saw only Aziraphale’s glowing face, huge and translucent, flickering, looming over him in a column of light. He could see every line, every feature even as he could see straight through them. He wished he was solid, wished he could reach out and touch, he wished—no, he had to focus.

“You okay to talk?”

“Well, I should think the time to ask that would have been before opening a direct line—”

“Yeah, well, I would have, if that had been _remotely_ possible. Could you for once just answer the bloody question?”

“Yes, Crowley. I can talk. For a little while at least. What is it you’d like to discuss?”

Crowley grimaced. This was going all wrong. Aziraphale was supposed to be overjoyed to see him, and Crowley would explain about the body, and Aziraphale would beam, and Crowley would go and find it and send Eric away and Aziraphale would come then, and everything would be bloody perfect and he was _stupid, stupid_ because of _course_ it wasn’t going to be like that. It wasn’t going to be like that at all.

“I think I figured out a way for you to come down,” he said. “Got you a body. Possibility.”

“Oh? And what exactly is a body possibility?”

“You know. A…” Crowley waved his hands impatiently, “...possible body. One not being possessed. Or, well, lived in, I guess. An empty body.”

Aziraphale’s eyes widened slightly, his lips pressing together. He didn’t look happy.

“Crowley—I—I do appreciate the effort you’ve quite obviously put into all of this. But, well, I can’t—as I believe I’ve explained—I simply can’t _do_ that anymore.”

“This isn’t like that, angel. It’s not _someone’s_ body. Least not one they need. You could make it your own. Immortal body and all that. Really.”

Aziraphale closed his eyes.

“It’s not that,” he said, sadly. “It’s just...I think Gabriel and the rest have caught on, rather, to my being here. They haven’t said anything, as such, but, well, I have noticed that whenever I attempt to...to _leave_ my hiding place, they are holding various meetings and functions in all of the relevant portal locations. So you see, unless I can find someone to...to _possess_ , I can’t get down at all. And as I’ve said, I _won’t_ do that. Not again.”

Crowley felt as if Aziraphale had plunged a blade into his heart. Not even for him, for _them_. He felt his foot wobble and he staggered a little.

“Be careful, dear. It won’t do to burn the shop down again.”

“Is that what happened?”

“Sergeant Shadwell, dear fellow, is what happened.”

Crowley frowned. _Another time,_ he told himself. _Save it for another time, because there will be another time._

“You can’t just...possess the body?”

“I need a channel,” Aziraphale said.

“Thought that’s what this was?’”

“This is more of a line. Think of it as the difference between a phone call and an open window. I can’t actually move through this, I’m afraid. _You_ could, with the proper preparations, though I doubt you’d want to join me in Heaven.”

Crowley shuddered, watched a small smile play around Aziraphale’s lips.

“But if there was, say, Newt Pulsifier here right now?”

“Leave Mr. Pulsifer out of this, Crowley. He’s done quite enough, I daresay, and deserves to indulge his mid-life crisis in peace. Or, well, without _our_ interference, at least.”

Crowley wondered what _deserving_ had to do with anything.

“I’m here,” he said.

“What? _No._ ”

“Hear me out! Hear me out. There’s a...a demon in the other room. Got your body. Would only be a few minutes. We’d know, right away, I think, if anything was going to...to be a problem. Could just stop.”

Aziraphale hesitated. _Yes_ , Crowley thought, _yes._ He knew that look. That look that spoke of Arrangements and wings held aloft in the rain and _oysters_ and... But Aziraphale shook his head.

“I really don't think I can.”

“Then I can’t either. Can’t go on, I mean. Might as well just step on this portal, beam myself up. Only way we’d be together.”

“Crowley, _no_. They’d _notice_. They’d find us both.”

“Maybe not. I’m willing to risk it. Maybe we’d find a way out, with both of us working on it.”

Aziraphale squeezed his eyes shut. Then he nodded.

“All right,” he said. “If it’s really...if it’s really that important to you.”

“You want me to come up?” Crowley felt sweat pricking his armpits, hot and cold at the same time. _Heaven_.

“No! I want...I want to try to...to inhabit your corporation. With you. If it’s all right.”

Crowley gave a huge sigh of relief.

“Yeah. Yeah. Let me just—Eric!”

The door to the backroom opened.

“What?” Eric’s eyes widened as he took in the column of light, Aziraphale’s floating head, the glowing portal. “What the—? I’m getting out of here.”

“Body. Then I don’t care where you go.”

Eric grimaced, then turned around and grabbed something. With a grunt, he shoved a copy of himself out of the back room. It looked terrified.

“Won’t last long when I’m out,” Eric said.

“I _know_ ,” Crowley snapped. Eric had been very clear about that during the drive.

“Wait!” the other Eric said. But the first Eric snapped his fingers and vanished, and with him, everything that had made the second corporation _Eric_ vanished, too. It crumpled and fell to the floor, a husk of a thing, hairless, with grayish flesh, but two arms, two legs, a head. It was disgusting, but it was breathing. It would have to do.

Aziraphale’s head twitched.

“What is—I can’t see. You look— _Crowley_?”

“I’m ready,” Crowley said. “I’m ready, angel. Come on.”

* * *

It felt like being filled, as if Crowley were an empty vessel for water, and someone was pouring, slowly, the exact amount of warm, soothing liquid to fill it comfortably. He felt the tendrils of him melt into Aziraphale, wrap around him and hold him there. He felt, rather than heard, Aziraphale gasp, and then there was a swelling in his chest that he worried was too intense to be right, but then he was laughing, and Aziraphale was laughing, and nothing else needed to be said.

They stayed that way a moment. Or it might have been hours. And then Crowley remembered the body.

“Can you move to the body?” Crowley said. “Maybe just...don’t look at it.”

“Crowley…” Aziraphale’s voice from his lips. Crowley licked them, knowing Aziraphale would feel it. He felt the blush rising to Aziraphale’s face, his face. He stroked his hand, not knowing which of them was doing what.

... you didn’t _kill_ …” Aziraphale finished.

“What? You know I don’t—”

“Or steal…” One hand gripped the other.

“Blackmail,” Crowley said. “Threatened a demon. He’s fine. He sheds them like skin.”

Aziraphale nodded Crowley’s head.

“All right, I won’t look,” he said. “Just...take me to it.”

Crowley let go of his own hand and took the distorted hand of the body. It felt warm at least, though it didn’t grip back.

“Ready?” he said. “Go on, angel.”

* * *

As intense as the possession had been, the separation did not hurt. It felt rather like the sensation of bringing a comb through slippery, detangled hair. Except if you were the hair. A few slight snags, but soft and easy to work through. No damage.

The problem was the body. Once Aziraphale was inside it, it still didn’t look different. It glowed slightly, and then it shifted. It—Aziraphale—struggled to breathe. He sat up, once, looked at Crowley through blank black eyes, his expression even in that unfamiliar face stricken with terror. Crowley leaned forward and held him.

 _Could Eric have done something to it?_ he wondered. He hadn’t thought an infernal body would be dangerous to him, because his own hadn’t been. But maybe that was just because it was... _his_.

Aziraphale gripped him hard. Crowley felt his strength coming through, felt a softness against his cheek, and when he pulled back, there was a short growth of hair on his head, soft and white, and his skin was several shades less gray, though still not anything remotely human-looking.

“Crowley,” Aziraphale rasped.

“I’m sorry,” Crowley said, panicking. “I...I thought…”

“It’s fine. I’m fine, my dear. Just...I need...will you turn off that portal before someone sees?”

Crowley stood up, took one of the candles and extinguished it, which seemed to have the desired effect. The portal went dark, harmless now. He blew out the rest of them and shoved the little round carpet back into place. When he came back, Aziraphale’s skin was merely pale, but now there was hair starting on his chest and...somewhere else. Crowley gave a cough and found a blanket for him in the backroom, where he lifted him onto the couch and covered him. Aziraphale shivered beneath it, his eyes closed, the lids of them, as he watched, slowly growing ringed with pale lashes.

Crowley gave an involuntary whimper. Maybe he ought to run up to the flat, grab some of Aziraphale’s things? But he’d never been up there. Aziraphale had never invited him there. So maybe it wouldn’t be the right thing. He didn’t know. He couldn’t think.

When he closed his eyes he saw only the two of them on a beach with chalky cliffs behind them. This time Aziraphale’s hand was his own, and this time he let Crowley hold it.

A tear made its insistent way down his cheek and he snapped his fingers, packing a few things: clothes, books, and lifted Aziraphale’s sleeping, shivering form into his arms, gasping a little as he turned his head toward Crowley’s chin, pressing his nose against his neck as Crowley shouldered his way out of the bookshop. Whatever this turned into, it was what they had chosen, and already Crowley knew that he did not regret it.

* * *

The cottage he found was small, but it was big enough for the two of them. Or once, at some odd point in Aziraphale’s convalescence, the three, then the four of them. (The body did seem to have certain duplicative features built in.) Crowley had been alarmed at first to find several Aziraphale-shaped figures sleeping, stuffed into the bed, but when he’d moved closer to adjust the blankets to cover them all, and possibly widen the bed a little, the one nearest nuzzled his hand and the three seemed to shift back into one beneath his touch. Aziraphale’s features were sharper now. More recognizably his own. And after several days, when no further duplications appeared to be forthcoming, and Aziraphale looked entirely familiar, Crowley relaxed a little.

But still, after a week, Aziraphale did not wake. He stirred sometimes, made sounds that might have been somnolent attempts at words, and Crowley could _feel_ that he was there, but he slept on.

 _Is this what it felt like_ , he wondered, when Aziraphale had wanted _him_ to wake, all those times Crowley had been too afraid to.

Was that it, then? Was Aziraphale afraid? Of this? Of acknowledging it, finally, the thing that had changed between them, that had finally made the possessions too hard to endure?

Crowley stood up from the chair where he sat and moved to the bed instead. He hesitated only a moment before he lay down beside the angel, took his hand, and closed his eyes.

 _Please_ , he thought, and let his own fear ebb away, forced himself to face the way this closeness, this hope, caused his heart to fill up with love. For once, he hoped Aziraphale would feel it, see it clearly for what it was. He wouldn’t run. Crowley was sure now.

* * *

He didn’t want it to be a dream, but it had to be, because Aziraphale was standing at the window, and there was the sound of the ocean, and the sound of his name, as he sat back against the pillow, scrambling, grasping desperately for wakefulness.

“Angel?”

But it had to be a dream, because Aziraphale was approaching, smiling, looking around at the room—the shelves of books, the closet full of his horrible old clothes—and he was wearing a blue shirt, and a bowtie, and the awful shoes he’d gotten in the 1840s, and he was kneeling and taking Crowley’s hand and calling Crowley dearest, and Crowley couldn’t hear him anymore, because it was a dream. It had to be, and so he fell forward onto Aziraphale’s new shoulders and let Aziraphale lift him up, and cried.

It wasn’t a dream, but Crowley wasn’t quite awake enough, and everything hummed with a raw, dreamy energy. They couldn’t let go of each other, and Aziraphale said,

“Is this the place—?”

And Crowley nodded and said. “We could go for a walk.” He took Aziraphale’s hand and lifted it. “Could...could do it properly this time.”

Aziraphale smiled. He raised one hand to Crowley’s cheek and looked at him, a long, deep look that Crowley could fall into. Those eyes...after so long, solid and seeing…

He made a weird noise and leaned forward, and his lips, wet with tears, bumped against Aziraphale’s. Aziraphale’s arms came up around him and pulled him close. He kissed back.

“I love you, Crowley,” he said, when they broke apart.

But that wasn’t...that was Crowley’s line. And this...it made his chest hurt, made him sputter and gasp. Crowley tried to speak, but he couldn’t, could only shake and hold on, but that was all right, because Aziraphale shook his head and said, “Oh, darling, I know. I know.”

And then, softer, almost as if he didn’t mean for Crowley to hear, “I’ve always known.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to CumaeanSibyl for the beta read!


End file.
